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Turkey fires on Syria in retaliation for latest shelling

Turkey fired on Syria for a fifth straight day on Sunday after a Syrian shell struck the border town of Akcakale. Last week five civilians were killed when a Syrian mortar hit the same town, prompting Turkey to authorise military action.

Turkey’s military fired an artillery round into Syria on Sunday in immediate retaliation after a shell fired from Syria landed in the Turkish border town of Akcakale, the Dogan news agency reported. This is the second such incident in the town in five days.

The latest Syrian shell landed near a plant belonging to the Turkish Grain Board, several hundred metres from the centre of Akcakale, where five civilians were killed on Wednesday in a previous Syrian shelling. There were no immediate reports of casualties in the latest incident.

Sunday’s skirmish is the fifth straight day mortar fire has been exchanged between the two countries.

On Saturday Turkey hit back against what it said was a fresh round of mortar fire from Syria, little more than 24 hours after UN condemnation of deadly cross-border bombardment.

Syria-Turkey border tensions

UN condemnation

Syria, for its part, said four Turks were among a convoy of "terrorists" killed in fighting in the heart of Aleppo, just hours after the UN condemned the deadly bombings in Syria’s commercial capital.

Turkish officials said they were sure the mortar round that struck on Saturday morning was fired by pro-government forces, and not the rebels who have been fighting for nearly 19 months to oust President Bashar al-Assad.

The round struck Hatay province at the western end of Turkey's frontier with Syria, prompting fresh retaliatory fire after reprisals on Wednesday and Thursday for the previous shelling, the provincial governor's office said.

"A mortar round struck Saturday at 7:00am (0400 GMT) about 50 metres (yards) inside Turkish territory in an open space about 700 metres from the village of Guvecci and about 300 metres from a police station."

No casualties were reported, it added.

The Turkish army responded with four rounds of mortars, the statement said, adding that the Syrian fire had come from loyalists who were firing at rebels near the border.

A monitoring group, meanwhile, said rebels seized a Syrian village across the border from Guvecci after hours of fierce fighting on Saturday in which 25 troops and three insurgents were killed.

Turkey Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Rebels took control of Khirbat al-Joz, near the town of Jisr al-Shughur, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Tit for tat exchanges

The cross-border exchanges came after late Thursday’s deadly shelling from the Syrian side further east in Sanliurfa province that killed five people.

The bombardment on Wednesday evening of the border town of Akcakale, which Turkish officials said Syria later apologised for, prompted counter-shelling that the Syrian ambassador to the United Nations said wounded two soldiers.

The Turkish parliament authorised further military action but Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he was not looking for a mandate for war, although he warned there would be "a big price" to pay for any further attacks on its citizens or territory.

The Syrian Observatory reported fresh retaliatory shelling by the Turkish army from Sanliurfa province against Syrian positions late on Friday.

"Two Turkish army shells struck south of Tal al-Abyad on Friday evening," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP, referring to the border area across from the town of Akcakale where the five Turks were killed.

In its statement Thursday, the UN Security Council "demanded that such violations of international law stop immediately and are not repeated."